THE OPINION OF THE “WORLD” – SHOULD NOT BE LOST
For ten years, Boris Lojkine has been filming fiction, strongly tinged with reality, throughout the African continent. He films those who flee from him (a couple of emigrants on their way to Europe in Hopein 2014), who join him risking their lives (photographer Camille Lepage in stretcher2019), and today, with Souleymane’s storyone of those who made the trip successful, but at what cost?
It takes place in Paris and the hero of this impressive drama is called Souleymane. Originally from Guinea, in his twenties, illegally awaiting regularization: the character owes a lot to the story of his (excellent) interpreter, Abou Sangare. Three imperatives demand it, which exclusively fuel the plot of the film: earn something to eat, ensure a roof over your head, prepare for the asylum application interview.
Inwardly, perhaps we think of something “architectural, anti-romantic.” It’s quite the opposite. Relatively little seen and romantic at full speed. We know the reason, which lies in the title of a canonical film: Rosette (1999), by the Dardenne brothers. With Emilie Dequenne, in every aspect, as a heroine who fights step by step against precariousness, intensified and magnified by the handheld camera. Copied endlessly ever since, the film has had few fans worthy of the name. Luisa Wimmer (Cyril Mennegun, 2012) was one of them. Souleymane in another. Hey, three titles, three names. Or films that announce color, putting the individual in the center, or etymologically what is indivisible, that is, unique.
A very fragile balance
Added to the security of this integrity is one of the great virtues of this Dardenian-inspired cinema: the deliberate absence of discourse and morality. Pure behaviorism brings the viewer to the side of the hero. His most trivial problems become ipso facto those of the viewer, especially when he understands to what extent they are vital for the character.
In the case of Souleymane, the entire skill of the script, which does not invent anything, consists in showing us to what extent this character’s life is based on a very fragile balance. Borrowing, going into serious debt, the identity of an aigrefin in order to be a deliveryman. Pedaling day and night with incredible synchronization. He runs to avoid missing the bus that takes him to the emergency accommodation center. Mentally repeating all this time the supposedly credible story that another sourfin is teaching his compatriots in preparation for their asylum interview.
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